Monday, January 30, 2012

(The
last time I posted “Random Ramblings” was way back in August, 2011.)

-30
days out of the 366 days in 2012 are already over :O Makes me take a step back
and think where the last 30 days have gone.

30 days is a lot of time. Let me see if I can remember anything about the past two days.

-Yesterday
(the 29th of Jan, 2011), I wrote the selection test for the
International Olympiad in Linguistics. I had to travel all the way to
University of Hyderabad’s campus in Gachibowli (23 km from my home) to write
this exam. To be honest, it didn’t go that well. I did give it my best shot but
I guess I wasn’t ready. Anyway, I’ll do a lot lot better the next time around.

-Today,
I had my science Unit Test which went pretty well. Expecting just a mark less
than 20.

-Also,
the school round for the Marrs Spelling Bee was held in my school. It also went
pretty well and I got selected from my class along with a friend (anyone
remember the “giraffe” from “31-29 Boy What a match”?) I think I aced the
dictation round. I could just unjumble 3 words out of the 10 though. That kinda
surprised me as well. The oral round was okayish.

Speaking of exams, I just realized something.
Other than the school pre-finals and the board exams, I do not really have any
other exams. That means I can concentrate fully on acing my school exams.
Interesting. :P

My next unit test is on 1st
Feb which coincides with the day after tomorrow. Wait a second, shouldn’t that
have been the other way around?

Thursday, January 26, 2012

I
woke up feeling quite low today. My eyes felt groggy didn’t feel like doing
anything. I so wanted to study for stuff but I just couldn’t get myself to.
Instead, I plonked down and started watching TV but got bored soon.

It
felt queer. I couldn’t quite pin-point what was causing it.

I was
walking from one room to another without any purpose when my glance fell on
something. “OMG” Was the first thought that came into my mind.

Over the next 2 seconds, it struck me
nice and full.

Apparently,
I hadn’t drunk water since the past 36+ hours.

From
11:30 pm(24th Jan) to 1:30 pm(26th Jan), I hadn’t drunk
water. That’s about 38 hours if I’m not mistaken. In that period, all I had
drunk was three glasses of milk but no water.

Voila!

I
instantly took a glass and filled it up with water and drunk it. Repeated that
cycle 3 times until I became ‘active’ again and could do stuff.

Seriously, I never thought water was so
important. It gained a whole lot of respect from me today.

Monday, January 23, 2012

Have you guys ever heard of
a debt trap? A person(usually an Indian farmer) is said to have fallen into one
when he goes on paying money but the debt never seems to be cleared and if
anything, appears to grow more in size.

Sound familiar?

Almost
everyone falls into a trap like this right from when they’re 3 years old until their
mid-twenties.

Now?

Yes, I
mean the exam-trap. If you compare them, you don’t really see much difference.
Each one of them sucks the blood of the person who falls into it. The exams
never seem to end. If one ends, the other starts within a few weeks. And the
best of all, each year, the amount of portion keeps on increasing.

To be
entirely honest, I wrote the above from the general point of view. Personally,
I don’t really hate exams. It feels good to be tested once in a while and come
out on top of everyone else. (Not blowing my own trumpet but it happens more
often that not) I like the challenge that the exam gives. It is during exam
times that I happen to use my actual mind the most because it’s a challenge
that I love to beat.

Over
here in India, we people take 10th grade very seriously. Everyone’s
like

“Study..study..study..You need to get good marks in your 10th
board-exams..Study..study..study.” I find it a tad bit funny.

Anyway,
it’s the time of the year when I have to write Unit-tests, Pre-finals and
finally (the exams that matter the most) the board exams.

My
unit-tests are starting from the 25th of Jan, the day after
tomorrow. The first exam’s Math. They end on the 6th of February.

After
that we write what people call the pre-boards. They are conducted in the 3rd
week of February over a period of five days.

After
all this, the real-deal starts. The board exams start from the 2nd
of March and occur over a period of 24 days till the 26th of
February.

I’m not
sure if I’m looking forward to that final exam on the 26th of
February. Part of me gets excited at the prospect of finally being done with school
while the other part doesn’t want to leave it. Got too many sweet/fond memories
attached to it.

Aah.
Like it or not, I’ll have to write that final exam and get done with school.
The whole world’s ahead of me.

Anyways,
over the next few days expect posts that’ll be me writing out my thoughts on
the exams that I’ll be writing.

Btw, I’m writing the selection test for the IOL this Sunday
in Hyderabad….. It’s hard. Never thought I’d say it but, it’s hard. I’ll need
loadsa practice before I’m comfortable with it! Hope I do well J

Thursday, January 19, 2012

What
follows is the key(for the 10th class paper) of the 2nd International English Olympiad
conducted by SOF in association with the British Council.

The
following are the answers that I think are the correct answers. Don’t worry
though, except one or two, most of them are the correct answers. If you don’t agree
with any of the answers below, you can comment on this post and I’ll follow up.

By the
way, I’ve made a few mistakes and as far as I know, I’ll be getting something
around 46. Let me know how many marks you’re scoring in the comments section J

Wednesday, January 11, 2012

Anyways, what follows is a very-very long entry(around 1600+
words). It’s just me rambling. But, if you like sports, you should probably
give it a read. I’ve done some analysis on Volleyball and (kind of) published
my results here.

Here goes,

While we were sitting on the
sidelines watching our classmates play volleyball (terribly), my friend
retorted “I don’t understand this. All of us started playing the volleyball at
the same time but, why are some better than the others?” I just shrugged off
the question at that moment but, it sure did get me thinking. Especially after
I watched like 3 hours of the Big Bang Theory(the sitcom) on the Television.

There
are a number of possible reasons for the above being true. I’m going to list
them all here and explain my views about each one of them.

Yes,
it’s true that all of us started playing volleyball at around the same
time(around two years ago). However, that in no way indicates the amount of
time each one has spent.

While I
was thinking about all those who played well, something jumped out on me.
Everyone one of them owned a volleyball. But that doesn’t mean that you’ll be
good at volleyball if you own a volleyball because there’s this one kid who
indeed does own a volleyball but, he isn’t that great in playing it. There must
be something else behind this. That is practice. I think that’s the main thing
that separates those who play well from those who doesn’t. Atleast in my case,
it does.

While
other’s just played/practiced at school only, the volleyball bug caught me. I
bought a ball and started practicing it at home as well. I’m no athlete, let me
tell you that. But, when I catch a bug, it gets pretty crazy. Volleyball
dominated my life during that time. I mean, if I wasn’t at school, I was in front
of my house practicing volleyball using the walls of my house. Even when it
turned dark, you could hear a constant hammering sound inside the house. That
would be me banging the ball on the wall.

I used
to do it for like 1-2 hours a day. Now, I don’t know how much time I exactly
spent on doing this or how much time the bug had me but, it was enough for me
to be ‘better’ than the average kid at the game.

That’s
one reason, more practice.

However,
that’s not the only factor that I think led to this disparity among the
students. Something called ‘motivation’/ ‘desire’ also played a big-big role.

I’m a
stickler for sports. I love playing them(not what you’d expect from a nerd
eh?). I especially love team sports. When we(my class) started playing volleyball,
we were complete beginners. Seriously, I didn’t know the abc of volleyball.
People had to coerce me into playing it at the start but soon, as I like to say
it, the bug caught me. I began finding volleyball more and more fun. I wanted
to get better and better. There was a desire inside me to be better than the
rest and that made me try and give my best at the game(or at practice for that
matter). All the good players that my friend was hinting at, love the game.
That’s what matters, you’ve got to love the game to be good at it. It’s pretty
much the same for everything that you do. If you want to be good at it, start
loving it.

What
else? Well, I think your agility too plays a very important role for this
specific game.

You do
know what agility means, don’t you? It basically means your ability to move
around. If you are agile, you can move about pretty quickly and that definitely
helps. Especially in this game. Actually, moving away from the topic, the first
time I came across this particular word was when I was playing with those
Pokemon cards. Each pokemon had a measure of agility and that was the first
time I came across that word. See? Cartoons do help!

Anyways,
as I was saying, agility also played a very important role. At least I think it
did. Now, I pride myself for being agile. I may not be able to touch the ground
with my hands without bending my legs but, I can move about pretty quickly.
Every time I fall, my hands move like lightning to break the fall and cause as
minimum damage as possible. There have been times when I managed to duck just
in time. However, you cannot call me graceful. I’m agile but, there’s not even
an iota of gracefulness in me. Seriously, I might look really ‘idiotic’ while
running or moving about on the court but, I get the job done! Sigh. How I wish
people understood that one thing.

Coming
back, one other thing that I’ve noticed in all those who’re better in
volleyball is that they’re agile. Those who weren’t sure did have a
disadvantage.

Also,
your willingness to learn also matters a lot. I for one have been very open
about my desire to learn volleyball. I browsed stuff on the internet, read
books, asked my coach for some advice and all. Some people just didn’t want to
learn and now, I see them messing it up on the court and when I tell them that
I’ll be in their place because they aren’t doing it properly and the team’s
suffering, they tell me “I’m learning Adarsh. Let me.” Seriously, my blood
curdles when they reply that. YOU DON’T LEARN ON THE COURT! YOU’VE TO LEARN
OUTSIDE IT! If you aren’t willing to put the time or efforts then you aren’t
going to get well at doing that anytime soon.

One
other pet peeve that I have is that I hate it when people think somebody is
watching them and try to serve in a ‘cool’ way and that serve just ends up
going outside. Volleyball is not a spectator sport! Actually, it probably is a
spectator sport but please don’t mind them! Stop trying to look cool while
playing, it does more harm than you know of.

There’s
one last thing that I think separates those who play well from those who don’t.
TEAM WORK. Those 8 letters are really really important if you want to do well
in any team sport. Volleyball isn’t a game where a single player who plays
really well can make up for the rest. I’ve learnt that time and again and it’s
probably settling into my brain finally.

While I
was thinking all this, some unusual things came up. What I said above doesn’t
explain why someone is good at serving, why someone can play the upper-arm pass
okayish but is pretty terrible at the under-arm pass, why someone plays the
under-arm pass extremely well but upper-arm pass not so well, why someone is an
expert in the under-arm serve and not in the upper-arm serve, why some of us
play better than the others?

Now,
I’m a scientist(say it's true for the time-being) and I believe that there’s an explanation for
everything.(except for one thing that humans can’t fathom. I’ll talk about that
later.)

How
could I explain the above? After a bit of thinking, the answer dawned upon me.

I’d
read this ‘different’ book sometime ago. It was called Outliers by Malcolm
Gladwell. Once I remembered it, it all began making sense. I got the answers to
all of the above questions. Now, before I go any further, let me tell you this.
I’d suggest you read that book but there’s a warning that I’d like to give. To
some people, the book may seem ‘depressing’ but for others, you’ll be a bit
dazed. I was one of those who were dazed and not an iota of depression. But,
it’s a good read. Try it out, you never know which one of them you’ll turn out
to be.

The
book basically deals with different stuff but, for my explanation, you just
need to know one thing. When people spend more time on one thing than the
others, they get better at it. If you spend round about 10,000 hours on doing
something, you’ll be an expert in that particular field. But, that 10,000 hours
is just an estimate. It may take 9,000 or 11,000 or maybe even more.

Anyways,
so basically, if you spend more time on doing something, you will get better at
that. You are probably like “Duh! What’s new in that?” What you fail to notice
is how that one thing explains all the questions that came up.

AAA.
He’s somebody who’s good at serving. Why? When we first started playing, we
were all assigned positions. Each one was given a position where he played
best. AAA was in the serving position. He had this teenie-meenie advantage at
the start in serving so he became the server. Now, that teenie-meenie advantage
soon turned into a huge one. Why? Because, he served every single ball. He got
loads of practice during the match itself and soon caught hang of it. Hence,
he’s good at it.

The
same goes for the rest. The kid who’s good at the under-arm pass and not at the
upper-arm pass is so because when he first started playing the position he was
assigned to was the back ones. That made him use his under-arm more than his
upper-arm and hence, he became good at only one skill and not the other. The
vice-versa goes for the kid who’s good at the upper-arm and not at the
under-arm pass. The one who serves well using the under-arm is so because he
uses that serve mostly and not the upper-arm one.

See? It
all makes sense now.

Alright. Alright. I'll stop. Just get up. I don't like people touching my feet and begging me to stop #kidding.

That concludes a post that I'd written a long time ago but never really got around posting it.

Thursday, January 5, 2012

(PS : If you want to, just skip 451 words to that's where the post actually starts :P)

Intuition.

This would be the Chinese symbol for intuition

Wikipedia describes it as the ability to acquire knowledge
without inference or the use of reason.

For me, it’s
just the voice in me that tells me what to do without giving any reason.

As a kid,
I used to watch cricket (I’ve got cricinfo for that now). More often than not,
I was put-forth the question “Who’s going to win this match?” I always told
them what my intuition told me and voila! It was true almost always! Now, people
might attribute that to luck but not me.

I’m sorry but your dreams of kidnapping me and becoming a
millionaire by betting are dashed. Those days of guessing the result of a
cricket match correctly are gone. My intuition doesn’t reply anymore when I ask it who’s
going to win the match.

It was
evening and I was attending some class on Math. The teacher wrote a problem on
the board and asked us the answer.

“There is a number whose two digits are equal
to one another. If you square the number, you will get a four-digit number
whose first two digits equal each other and the last two digits also equal each
other. What is the original number?”

To be
entirely honest, I didn’t have a whisker of an idea how I was going to solve
that particular problem. Intuition took over me. I wrote two numbers down on
the blank page in front of me and multiplied them. Voila! They turned out to be
the required numbers. Everyone in the class was like “ :O ” when I gave the
correct answer.

Some
people call it luck. I call it ‘intuition’.

Now,
before you start trusting your intuition, I want to type out a disclaimer.

Intuition
doesn’t always work. Period.

Nobody’s
been happier than me when they trust their intuition and go ahead but, nobody’s
been more disappointed with it when it didn’t work out the way it was supposed
to.

I don’t
guess on MCQ test papers. But, on a particularly hard test which I hadn’t
studied for, I had to guess.

Attempting
a problem gave me a 25% chance of getting it right.

So, I
turned to my intuition for help.

I marked A ,a, b, c, d, a, c, a,…..etc and finished with
it. I was pretty jubilant at the end of the exam. I was pretty confident of
doing real good on it.

I learnt
it the hard way that intuition doesn’t really work well when you’re writing
exams :P I score real low(like real-real low) on that test. But hey, I did
learn a lesson!

Anyways, the reason I’m writing this post is…. (You all are
probably like, you should’ve said that 456 words ago! I know..I know…I rant a
lot)

So, this
December, I took a decision. I had to choose between Yes/No (Duh!). Most people
expected me to say ‘Yes’ but, I said ‘No’. And they were all like “Why?” I told
them I don’t know! My mind is telling me to say no. They were like “Yeah. Right
#sarcasm”

To be
honest, I still don’t have any idea why or what made me say ‘No’ and why I didn’t
relent even after so many people told me to reconsider. But, looking back, it
was a great choice. Steve Jobs was right. You can’t connect the dots going
forward, you can only connect them going backward.

A lot of ‘amazing’
things happened in the past few days. Had I said “yes”, they probably wouldn’t
have happened.

One of
them was the International Linguistics Olympiad

By the way, it's not just another olympiad. At least, it isn't for me. Checking out one of their problem here -- click here(IN A New tab ofcourse. Don't leave my blog just yet :P)

I was just
browsing through the MIT admission’s website(Yep. Again. Must be my hundredth
time) when I saw something called “International Linguistics Olympiad’. For
reasons that are still unclear *cough* intuition *cough* I browsed through the
website and instantly sent a mail asking for more details. 4 days later, it’s
confirmed. I’ll be going to Mumbai(most probably) on this 29th and
writing a selection test for representing Team India at the IOL 2012, Slovenia.
Now, I’m terribly excited about this. IOL problems are my stuff. I mean, those
problems are meant for me. ( Don’t get it? Never mind.)

Now, had I
said ‘Yes’, I wouldn’t have had the faintest idea that something like IOL even
existed. Because I trusted my intuition and went forth with it, I’m getting a
shot at representing India at the IOL 2012 in Slovenia. It’s just a ‘shot’ I
know. But, my intuition tells me I’m going to rock the selection test(see?).
Just need some practice.

The other
amazing stuff will have to wait some more time because if you’re still reading
this. Your brain cells are probably cursing me for making them work overtime(no
offense! :P).

Next time
you are faced with a choice, go with your intuition! Follow it’s advice long
enough and you’ll know you took the best choice!